Xbox One games with Gold is now live! Apparently even if you don't have an Xbox One, but do have Gold, you can grab these licenses. If you buy an Xbox One in the future, you'll start off with a game library.

Xbox One games with Gold is now live! Apparently even if you don't have an Xbox One, but do have Gold, you can grab these licenses. If you buy an Xbox One in the future, you'll start off with a game library.

Yeah. PS3 users with PS+ have been doing that with the free games for PS Vita and PS4. Games with Gold was pretty anemic before, but it has been drastically improved. MS has really been listening to their users, and consumers as well, lately.

So my TV has run out of HDMI ports but my component ports are empty. Obvious solution, get a 360 Component cable. It arrived Monday and... Everything looks crap. The picture is too dark, text has ghosting, it's ghastly!

Is this a problem with the Component cable I purchased or 360 Component cables in general?

So my TV has run out of HDMI ports but my component ports are empty. Obvious solution, get a 360 Component cable. It arrived Monday and... Everything looks crap. The picture is too dark, text has ghosting, it's ghastly!

Is this a problem with the Component cable I purchased or 360 Component cables in general?

Xbox One games with Gold is now live! Apparently even if you don't have an Xbox One, but do have Gold, you can grab these licenses. If you buy an Xbox One in the future, you'll start off with a game library.

I got the update as well, and it's the one that removed the Gold check on Netflix et al.

Maybe people who keep up with Major Nelson's blog know better already, but when I get a system update, I just go to Reddit and r/Xbox360. I don't have an account there, I just figure somebody's asked, it's an easy enough to type URL, and I get the scoop from them. Anyway, the big changelog on this recent patch was that free accounts can now use media apps.

WRT Xbox One and Games for Gold, does the Xbox One still have platform-wide Gold? If it does, that could be why they require you to keep your Gold, if the whole console benefits. On the 360, one account with Gold does not elevate the other users. Personally I think there should be a master account, and if that account is Gold, the privileges should trickle on down to the other users. They could also, maybe, sell 'Gold consoles' that have a lifetime Gold subscription, for however much more.

Now what they need to do is, some kind of quick two-factor authentication. Imagine, you go over to your friend's house, who is also an Xbox gamer. Shame they dropped Kinect as a requirement... You say, Register guest user, and then spell out your gamertag, correcting it as it interprets it. Then you speak a passphrase. This causes Microsoft to ping your phone, and you enter a PIN number. Now your account is temporarily on the system and you can use all your saves and whatnot. That's how it should be. They're so close but not all the services match up, a couple require Gold, and it requires more work. Not to mention asking everyone to look away from a TV that isn't yours as you input your password—that's not cool at all.

Isn't the solution to put your profile on a thumbdrive and use that to sign in at your friends house? Or does that still require putting your password in?

It would be cool if they used smartglass for it though - sign in to smartglass and then either have the kinect read a QR type code from your phone screen, or have your phone camera scan a code that the Xbox puts on the TV.

360 Pro only has three USB ports, though. S has more and I don't know what E has. So if everyone brings a flash drive, things get hairy. Plus some people like wired controllers, and if you're playing Rockband, the mic takes up one as well.

I like the idea of using smartphones. Sony has a singing game coming out for PS4 where you use your phone to sing. That's a brilliant solution since music controller peripherals have fallen out of style. Even though the mic's just a dumb mic, works just fine on your PC as well, it's not a controller per se, it gets lumped in with them, though.

360 Pro only has three USB ports, though. S has more and I don't know what E has. So if everyone brings a flash drive, things get hairy. Plus some people like wired controllers, and if you're playing Rockband, the mic takes up one as well.

Those are some rather artificial restrictions you've created.Rockband came with a usb hub. So should know you can easily use one of those to fit said friends' extra thumbdrives.

Not so much artificial as specific to one game, but point taken. That's my background. I'm since retired from the game (people get real serious with it, like real band stuff, so yeah, I did have to 'officially retire'), I guess I should change my avatar, but I think it's a valid point. My point was, with the new technologies, between Kinect and SmartGlass/WP8/.1 and Android/iOS, we shouldn't have to fiddle with flash drives. (BTW, that hub required a power supply, and was very picky about when it wanted to work and in what order you plugged the controllers in... Never plugged flash drives into it. Always plugged them in direct.)

anyone else having issues with Xbox Live? i am getting signed out mid-game in CoD because Xbox Live is signing me out. seems like there have been some issues this week and past week, but did not notice anything until today.

in other news, The Wolf Among Us is pretty sweet, i think i got the first episode free via Gold, and the season pass is $14.99, which is a great deal and even price competitive with Steam.

The 500GB HDD is official. All those chinese knock-offs we've seen on Amazon for $50 were at least based on something legitimate. 'course, the legit drive is $109, but whatever.

I see at least one of these in my future. So out of space...

I thought that been the knock-offs topped out at 320gb, but now I think it's time to roll my own with a cheap 500gb drive to replace my original elite's 120gb unit which feels tiny after a year of games with gold and a few years of sales. I've no idea how people survive with a 20gb drive.

Oh no. The 500GB hddss.bin has been floating around since at least May.

Quote:

but now I think it's time to roll my own with a cheap 500gb drive to replace my original elite's 120gb unit which feels tiny after a year of games with gold and a few years of sales.

No real reason to make your own unless you don't trust the Amazon marketplace sellers. They're even Amazon Prime eligible, meaning Amazon has them in their warehouses and MS hasn't lifted a finger to stop them. This page even lists sellers that have them in the original form factor 360 HDD casings.

The 500GB HDD is official. All those chinese knock-offs we've seen on Amazon for $50 were at least based on something legitimate. 'course, the legit drive is $109, but whatever.

I see at least one of these in my future. So out of space...

I thought that been the knock-offs topped out at 320gb, but now I think it's time to roll my own with a cheap 500gb drive to replace my original elite's 120gb unit which feels tiny after a year of games with gold and a few years of sales. I've no idea how people survive with a 20gb drive.

I've only got a 60gb and as a result haven't downloaded most of the free Games for Gold, I just purchase them for now. I figured offical bigger HDDs were still WTF expensive. From that Amazon page it looks like they are a bit cheaper now but I don't have a slim, only on old Jasper unit.

I just cant bring myself to pay $300 for a new slim +bigger HDD when new consoles are out. I guess they will drop the price on it more at some point.

I've only got a 60gb and as a result haven't downloaded most of the free Games for Gold, I just purchase them for now. I figured offical bigger HDDs were still WTF expensive. From that Amazon page it looks like they are a bit cheaper now but I don't have a slim, only on old Jasper unit.

I just cant bring myself to pay $300 for a new slim +bigger HDD when new consoles are out. I guess they will drop the price on it more at some point.

I've only got a 60gb and as a result haven't downloaded most of the free Games for Gold, I just purchase them for now. I figured offical bigger HDDs were still WTF expensive. From that Amazon page it looks like they are a bit cheaper now but I don't have a slim, only on old Jasper unit.

I just cant bring myself to pay $300 for a new slim +bigger HDD when new consoles are out. I guess they will drop the price on it more at some point.

You could just buy the new drive and swap it into the external case.

And I've got an old spare case I can send you for the cost of mailing it, though I guess it would cost about the same to get one shipped from hong Kong on eBay.

I've only got a 60gb and as a result haven't downloaded most of the free Games for Gold, I just purchase them for now. I figured offical bigger HDDs were still WTF expensive. From that Amazon page it looks like they are a bit cheaper now but I don't have a slim, only on old Jasper unit.

I just cant bring myself to pay $300 for a new slim +bigger HDD when new consoles are out. I guess they will drop the price on it more at some point.

You could just buy the new drive and swap it into the external case.

And I've got an old spare case I can send you for the cost of mailing it, though I guess it would cost about the same to get one shipped from hong Kong on eBay.

It'd be easier to just re-use the existing external case and then just repurpose (or dispose of) the original 60GB drive it housed.

Metacritic reviews point to Hot Pursuit (highest user score and critic score), but I haven't played a NfS game since Most Wanted (2005 edition; seriously, how the hell do they release two games with the same exact name?). I loved Burnout 3, but never bought Revenge or Paradise.

Metacritic reviews point to Hot Pursuit (highest user score and critic score), but I haven't played a NfS game since Most Wanted (2005 edition; seriously, how the hell do they release two games with the same exact name?). I loved Burnout 3, but never bought Revenge or Paradise.

TELL ME WHERE TO SPEND MY MONEY

I've never played those NfS games, but weren't they eventually made by the same dev as Burnout anyway? I loved Burnout 3 also, probably was my favorite and also liked Revenge, but Paradise probably has the most value there, the open world gives you lots of options and play time.

Metacritic reviews point to Hot Pursuit (highest user score and critic score), but I haven't played a NfS game since Most Wanted (2005 edition; seriously, how the hell do they release two games with the same exact name?). I loved Burnout 3, but never bought Revenge or Paradise.

TELL ME WHERE TO SPEND MY MONEY

If you like the classic Burnout games, get Burnout Revenge. If you want something with an open-world setting, get Burnout Paradise. Those two are superior to the Need For Speed pair, IMO.